Ableton - max .als size that triggers "not enough memory..."

[[nis]]

Yes, this is the actual .als file size, not the project file size.

Whow. I'm pretty sure that your set is way too large to handle all this with 4 GB RAM. A normal Live set is just a very few Megabytes large. How many tracks and how many clips do you have in those sets which you can still open? To find the total number of clips, double click on a clip to display the clip view at the bottom, then hit APPLE+A. This will show you the total number of clips. Check Arrangement and Session View (if there are more clips).

It is not uncommon for me to have upwards of 130 tracks, all with effect presets on them.

.

Well, if you run into the limits of your computer or resp. of what's possible with the currently available technology, then I'm afraid there's not much we can fix for you. 130 tracks sounds way over the limits to me. Note that Live is generally more demanding on the CPU and RAM than other DAWs, which is due to the Session View architecture. Other, streamlined hosts can look ahead in time and schedule their tasks more efficiently in advance. If you need to do extremely large arrangements like these, then you are perhaps better off using a different DAW for such a job. (although I'm quite sure that a 130-track project will be problematic in other DAWs, too).

the fact remains that Live 7 never even ran into even the slightest hitch with .als sizes wayyyy higher than 149mb.

It might just be sheer luck that you didn't get this problem in Live 7. Try to open such a massive set in 7 and add some more stuff. I'm sure you're not far away from a memory overload / crash.

Best,
Nico

[swivet]

Thanks for taking the time on this.

I've been using this same setup since 6.0.1 though and never once encountered any memory errors until 8. My CPU usage rarely even spiked above 50% with all these. 6 and 7 both were a breeze with the exact same sets (I have a starter set that I usually begin with that contains many clips). Once opening this starter set in Live 8 I immediately begin to encounter problems.

Most of the artists I work with also have .als project files in upwards of 200mb as well so I always thought it was the norm. Mine are comparably smaller I have always noticed.

I have to say something is up man. If I never once ran into trouble with every minor and major release since 6.0.1, it doesn't seem like I should be having to go look at another DAW. Live has always been the best. Why now with the new latest and greatest is it no longer able to do the same things it was doing better 2 years ago?

[do_om]

I'm quite sure this has nothing to do with RAM but
more likely to be an error in the als file. Both
my projects that would not load are super light
affairs, just a few vsti's.

I had an issue in the past were Live would just
freeze during loading. Sometimes beachballin' on
me, sometimes just plain dead. Nobody could figure
out what was up.

I finally tracked it down to an issue with the
freezing of a vsti and preset handling !

Ableton's bugs are just freaky like that.

[[nis]]

Thanks for taking the time on this.

I've been using this same setup since 6.0.1 though and never once encountered any memory errors until 8. My CPU usage rarely even spiked above 50% with all these.

Your CPU load has absolutely nothing to do with this.

Most of the artists I work with also have .als project files in upwards of 200mb as well so I always thought it was the norm. Mine are comparably smaller I have always noticed.

An .als file which is larger than 20-25 MB is definitely not normal, regardless which Live version we are talking about. 130 tracks is not normal either. That's all I can say right now. NOTE: we are talking about the file size of the .als file, which only stores a the raw data of your Live set. We are NOT talking about the size of your project. A project can be 100 GB large if you want.

Please read my previous posts again and answer my "how many clips and tracks do you have in your set" question.

I have to say something is up man. If I never once ran into trouble with every minor and major release since 6.0.1, it doesn't seem like I should be having to go look at another DAW. Live has always been the best. Why now with the new latest and greatest is it no longer able to do the same things it was doing better 2 years ago?

Well, it is a completely new version. New features, new technologies going on under the hood, some things may be broken and may only cause problems with specific computer setups. This is the case with every major upgrade. If you didn't had any trouble with Live 6 or 7, great. Unfortunately you seem to have trouble with Live 8 now and we (Ableton) need to figure out if there is a problem indeed and/or what exactly is causing this. "Something is up" means as much as "my car is broken". Right now, after several forum topics and emails, we still have no clue what exactly your problem may be. According to the size of your .als files we suspect that you have your RAM overloaded because of too many clips, tracks and/or devices. Please answer my questions so that we can get at least a step further.

Best,
Nico

[[nis]]

I'm quite sure this has nothing to do with RAM but
more likely to be an error in the als file. Both
my projects that would not load are super light
affairs, just a few vsti's.

I had an issue in the past were Live would just
freeze during loading. Sometimes beachballin' on
me, sometimes just plain dead. Nobody could figure
out what was up.

I finally tracked it down to an issue with the
freezing of a vsti and preset handling !

Ableton's bugs are just freaky like that.

If you are experiencing similar problems with relatively small sets, please send them to [email protected].

Best regards,
Nico

[rubberduck]

I am experiencing the same problem on Live 8.0.4.

I think i know what my problem is, my .als file size is 150mb

I believe this problem might be due to me editing the same track into lots of small loops (ie taking the kick drum, snare etc) to remix a track. So in theory it is trying to load hundreds of the same track. I understand that the solution to this problem would be to consolidate the edits, but I cannot even access the file.

Is there any way of recovering the work?

[kleine]

Hello,

Can you access/load parts of this set in a new Live set (via the browser)?

Best,
Christian

[rubberduck]

Hi Christian,

Thanks for getting back to me. I have tried opening Track 1 from the browser but still getting the same error message.

Just so I am clear, is this not the intended way to edit samples from tracks?

I am going to try to send the large als file to the support email

Your help is appreciated

[kleine]

Hello,

You won´t have luck squeezing it through our mail system - please upload it to rapidshare, yousendit and the like.

Best,
Christian

[rubberduck]

I've zipped it to 10mb will that get through ok?